Maple Syrup and Birthday Cupcakes

This past weekend a good friend from high school was visiting Boston. K had a conference here last week and stayed to hang out this weekend. On top of hanging out with friends, Butler made it to the Final Four! K went to Butler and is the president of his local alumni club!


On Saturday we decided to partake in some local fun by heading up to New Hampshire to go to a maple house where they boil maple syrup. We had beautiful weather on Saturday. It was a bit chilly but sunny and not a cloud in the sky. After arriving at the Grant Family Maple House, we had some food and got in line to learn all about how maple syrup is made.


What we learned is that the sap from the trees has about 2-3% sugar in it straight from the tree. At that percentage, it would take 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of maple syrup!! So they first condense the sap until it reaches about 8% sugar. The sap is then boiled to evaporate off the water.


Once the temperature reads 7 degrees above the boiling point of water, you have syrup! The guy in the maple house even explained how they use a baraometer on the wall to get the barometric pressure so they know the exact boiling temperature of water for that given day. It was all very scientific and extremely interesting.


The small bottles of maple syrup were a sample from each batch they had made at the maple house this season. The guy explained that as the season goes on, the syrup tends to get darker due to the change in the amount of sugar in the sap.


Of course, we had to get some maple products while we were there. Obviously, maple syrup. We also got some maple candies, some maple sugar, and some maple pepper. Can’t wait to find creative ways to use the sugar and pepper. If anyone has suggestions, please let me know!


Also, since K’s birthday was last week, I made him some cupcakes to celebrate. I went with my go-to chocolate cupcake recipe. I love that you can whip these up by dirtying only one bowl and using a whisk! I dipped them in some ganache and topped with festive sprinkles. Aren’t they pretty?

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11 Responses to “Rocky Road Squares”

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    The Hungry Mouse — November 4, 2009 at 5:02 pm

    Drooling now! I’ll take two, please.

    +Jessie

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    Erin — November 4, 2009 at 5:56 pm

    Love them and will be making them this weekend!

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    JanuskieZ — November 4, 2009 at 6:00 pm

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    nutmegnanny — November 4, 2009 at 10:48 pm

    I’m totally drooling over these bars! I can’t believe how easy they are:)

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    We Are Not Martha — November 5, 2009 at 2:14 am

    How delicious do these look?!?! I might have to try these…

    Sues

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    Amy I. — November 5, 2009 at 6:38 am

    The ease of prep to impressiveness ratio of these bars looks extremely high 🙂 Added them to my to-do list…thanks for the inspiration!

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    biz319 — November 5, 2009 at 2:36 pm

    Wow, how easy is that??!! I may make those for our cookie exchange this year! 😀

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    stephchows — November 5, 2009 at 3:22 pm

    those things look jam packed with tastiness!

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    Erin — November 5, 2009 at 11:34 pm

    It’s nice to have an easy dessert recipe to turn to! I’m so glad you liked them!

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    Kristy — November 9, 2009 at 12:19 am

    Ummm.. AMAZING! I might have to try those ASAP!

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    Mermaid Sweets — November 10, 2009 at 3:13 am

    Thanks for posting, looks like a good and easy holiday addition.

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